Chair: David Katz, MD, MPH, FACPM                                               Staff: Jessica Cafarella

Since its report to the Board in February 2002, the ACPM Prevention Practice Committee has focused on: (1) creating a Committee Working Group to analyze the role and functioning of the Committee; (2) improving the guideline development process; and (3) drafting guidelines on Hepatitis A Vaccination, Screening for Chlamydia, Sexuality Education, and Adult and Childhood Immunizations. Current activities and upcoming plans in certain of these areas are outlined below.

David Katz, MD, MPH assumed the role of Chair of the Prevention Practice Committee in February 2002, taking over from Neal Kohatsu, MD, MPH. As Incoming Chair of the Committee, Dr. Katz created a Committee Working Group to examine ACPM’s existing guideline development process and to explore areas of potential improvement, as discussed by the Board of Regents at its February 2002 meeting. Members of the Prevention Practice Committee Working Group include David Katz, Neal Kohatsu, Dorry Lane, Don Gemson, and ACPM staff Mike Barry and Jud Richland.

One important role of the Prevention Practice Working Group has been to examine the types of guidelines produced by the College. ACPM currently produces practice policy statements on preventive medicine topics that are intended for the clinician mainly treating individuals (similar to those guidelines produced by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force). It also produces public policy statements that assess the efficacy and value of public health policies implemented at the local, state, national or international level (similar to those produced by the Task Force on Community Preventive Services). In addition, the College recently introduced position statements that are brief summaries of College viewpoints on important topics already the focus of an evidence review, analysis, and recommendations by one or more entities outside of ACPM. The ACPM Prevention Practice Working Group has discussed shifting the focus of ACPM’s guideline development towards less time-intensive position statements in order to increase the number of guidelines ACPM produces. This would mean a reduction in the number of ACPM practice and public policy statements created de novo (which can take up to 3 years to develop; the College has produced fewer than 20 over the past six years) and a significant increase in the number of reactionary position statements that the College produces (such as the position statement Preventing Handgun Injury approved by the Board in February 2002). ACPM currently is working with the American Journal of Preventive Medicine to create a memorandum of understanding clarifying that ACPM position statements would not need to be peer reviewed by the Journal, since they express the sole opinion of the College. Such an understanding would further expedite the guideline development process.

The Working Group also has discussed creating incentives for Prevention Practice Committee members to become more involved in guideline development. One such incentive includes assigning each statement to a specific Committee members responsible for overseeing its development in return for authorship of the statement.

The Prevention Practice Committee Working Group expects to present a complete plan for revising ACPM’s guideline development process to the Board via e-mail this summer or at the fall 2002 ACPM Board meeting.